Holly Timpener’s art performance A Spoon Full of Sugar was an interesting departure from what I would normally find myself doing on a Saturday morning. I arrived at The Art Gallery of Greater Victoria’s Spencer Mansion on Saturday, November 23 just as the performance was getting underway and had absolutely no idea what to expect, as my prior knowledge of Timpener’s oeuvre was just what their website had told me, which was basically nothing at all.
When I sat down in the beautiful foyer of the mansion, surrounded by stained glass and wood panelling, the first thing that I noticed was that the artist seemed somewhat unsteady on their feet, which was unsurprising as they were wearing a ridiculously tall set of stiletto high heels. These were paired with a pair of pinstripe slacks and no shirt, as Holly continuously carried a silver spoon heaped with sugar up the grand staircase of the foyer, and, once reaching the mezzanine, the sugar was dumped over the railing in the general direction of the crystal sugar dish that was its provenance. At this point, the artist would descend the staircase, gather whatever scant amount of sugar had actually made it into the bowl, smear it across their forehead, and then begin the endeavour over again. Occasionally they would replenish the sugar in the bowl from a paper bag of Rogers granulated sweetener.
It occurred to me that this was somewhat like the story of Sisyphus, doomed to forever roll a boulder up a hill only to have it roll back down again. This differed in that our Sisyphus was wearing stilettos and had a spoon, as well as our venue being slightly more glamorous and well attended than a hill in the Greek countryside. As this was being repeated ad nauseam, I began to look around and take stock of my fellow patrons of the arts; I found an interesting mixture of elderly people in wheelchairs with attendants scrolling their cell phones juxtaposed with young, aggressively enthusiastic art-school folk. I wondered what they would later say about this, as they all seemed to be enraptured by Timpener and their Sisyphean sugar adventure.
I continued to watch this performance and its odd dichotomy of viewers for a little over an hour, at which point I realized nothing else was going to take place and made my way to the exit. As I was passing through the doors, I thought about how much sugar was crunching beneath my boots, and wondered whose job it would be to clean the floors. I wondered if their opinion of the performance may differ somewhat from the bubbling cadre of art students whose eyes were glued to the artist as they once again filled their crystal sugar dish from their paper bag.
As I drove out of the parking lot I wondered if anyone would want to watch me dump sugar off my balcony. Ultimately I decided it was better left to the professionals.